


The Long Journey Back to Konoha

by Smuppetsona (CarcharodonOrcinus)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Boruto Who? Didn't happen., M/M, Post-Canon, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-08-31
Packaged: 2019-05-16 10:12:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14809329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CarcharodonOrcinus/pseuds/Smuppetsona
Summary: Everything can change in 3 years--Sakura, Naruto, you. Even though your team has been reunited you still feel a rift between yourself and the village you live in, and worst of all, the love of the boy you came back for no longer feels like enough, but his love is still all you have."Because I'm your friend" has become a poison in your heart that you long to find the antidote for.To put it slightly less melodramatically, therapy and love are shams and the village is a cesspit.





	1. Never Stop Laughing Like That

Steam fills the bathroom as water streams down your back and you sit at the bottom of the shower, contemplating. You do this every time you shower (which is admittedly not as often as you’d like, but you have “depression” now and lack the drive to put in the basic work of being alive half the time), but lately you’ve come back to the same thought: Naruto.

His goofy smile, his blond hair, tanned skin, and stupid whiskers, his grating voice, his dumbass remarks, his body lying next to yours while you bled out, his eyes when he looks at you in the morning. Him, him, him--all about _him._ And it’s driving you up the wall how often you think about him now. Everything he does has to be mined for all meaning like never before, because you have it bad.

It’s hard to say when _because I’m your friend_ stopped being an acceptable answer, and as the years passed, _because when I thought of you, it just hurt_ stopped being enough too. You think you stopped feeling satisfied with it not long after you moved in with him--right around the time you started needing to catch your breath when you saw him in the wrong light. And now, like a schoolgirl, you’re over-analyzing every brush of his hand against yours, every wayward glance in your direction, every millisecond extra he spends hugging you, desperate to find some hint, some clue, that will lead you to the answer you want to hear.

You feel like you’re trying to hold rain from the earth every time you jerk your hand away and avert your gaze, but you cannot stand the child your longing has turned you into, and worse, you cannot stand the idea of causing him more misery by inflicting your affections on him. Yet you cannot stop yourself from wanting. That goofy, toothy grin, full of hope and naivety and wisdom, gets you every time and your chest swells fit to burst with breaths you’ve forgotten to exhale. He rises like the sun and you could bask in the glow of him your whole life long if only you could just--

“Sasukeeeee,” he calls from outside the bathroom, voice muffled, “stop hogging all the hot water!”

“Gimme a minute, I have to rinse my hair!” you snap back while opening the bottle of shampoo.

“You’ve had an _hour_ to rinse your hair! Hurry the fuck up; I have to pee!”

“You didn’t have to force me to move in with you,” you say, scrubbing your scalp and knocking the conditioner to the ground, “you could’ve let me get my own place but you just _had_ to have me live with you.”

“First off, no one would’ve rented you an apartment then, and second off, it’s been a year so if you wanna move out, be my guest,” he growls, barely audible. You can practically hear the pout.

After a couple minutes have passed without a response from you, he starts beating on the door until you stop the water, the rhythmic thudding letting you know exactly how mad he is. You decide this is a fantastic time to torment him, and decide to take your sweet-ass time toweling off and getting dressed. He only stands about 30 seconds of this before he’s threatening to blow the door off its hinges.

“It’s your door, moron. See if I give a shit,” you respond.

“You get ‘till I count to ten or I’ll do it! I’ll put a rasengan through this thing!”

You roll your eyes. Neither of you can afford to buy a new door right now, and there’s no way he intends to spend the next month doing his business in front of an empty door frame.

“One--”

You hang the towel back on the rack--

“Two--”

\--and start slipping your shorts on--

“Three--”

\--followed by your shirt.

“Four--”

You mop up the excess water on the floor and shower wall, taking you through “Five” to “Seven.” You wipe down the mirror--

“Eight--”

\--to clear off the steam, then straighten up--

“Nine--!”

\--a knocked over bottle on the counter before--

“TEN!!!”

\--opening the door.

“FUCKING FINALLY!” he screeches, pushing past you into the bathroom. Chakra dissipates from his hand.

“You were really going to bust up your own door?”

He casts you a dirty look and slams the door in your face. You burst out laughing.

“STOP IT! IT’S NOT FUNNY!” he shouts at you, his voice still impressively loud and grating through the barrier. But you do not listen. He’s too funny not to laugh at.

Besides, you know how he really feels about your laugh.

_Early dawn is caught in his hair, and his new right arm is slung around your shoulder. Sake gifted from an old man kicked out after last call hangs in the air between you, the conclusion to an all-night celebration of your second return to the village. At only 18 years old, you had to drink back at his place, soon to be yours too, but not yet._

_“Looks like the sun’s coming up,” you say._

_He rolls his eyes exaggeratedly and says, “Dumbass, it does that every day.”_

_It’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever heard, but you can’t help laughing. Maybe it’s the sake, or how close you are to him, but you feel warm ready for something. It’s hard to place what. Maybe for anything. You could be caught here forever and you’d never mind._

_He pulls you closer with a giggle and tells you, “I never thought I’d get to hear you laugh so easy! Way better than all your dumb_ tch _’s and smirks or whatever.” He presses his cheek to yours, and speaks again, “Don’t ever stop laughing like that, okay? I really like it.”_

As the sound of the shower turning back on and Naruto shrieking at the cold water brings you back to the present, you realize you really need to get out of this damn house for a bit, before thinking about Naruto can consume what’s left of your brain.

“I’m gonna go pick up Sakura from her shift,” you shout over him.

“Tell her hi from me!” he shouts back.


	2. A Very Ordinary Lunch Date

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sasuke goes out for a meal with Sakura.

Sakura rushes into the teashop with the urgency of a woman about to go into surgery. With a disgruntled sigh, she collapses into the seat across from you, her ponytail and uniform disheveled from the long night-shift at the hospital, only perking up when she sees you’ve already ordered tea for her (her favorite is jasmine). She eagerly takes a long drink.

“I thought you told me they were taking you off the night shift soon,” you say.

With a _tap_ she sets her half-drained cup back down and responds, “Apparently not. We’re still understaffed, and we need someone with my level of experience on call for emergencies.”

“Can’t Shizune do it?”

She groans in frustration with your lack of intimate knowledge of how her hospital functions.

“Lady Tsunade wants Shizune on the day shift so she can train new recruits, and they’re my seniors so I can’t really contest it.”

You take a sip of your tea to stifle the urge to tell Sakura to call both of them geriatrics fuckers who can’t tell her when to work. Last time you did that, she slapped you and told you to learn some goddamn respect for your elders. You put the cup down once you’ve thought of something nice to say.

“I’ll be seeing Kabuto at the orphanage next month; I can talk to him about helping staff the hospital until someone else can cover for you.”

Relieved, she thanks you and finishes her tea just before your meals arrive.

“So why did you really want to talk to me? Naruto problems, right?”

You scowl.

“Why would it be ‘Naruto Problems’...” you mutter into your tea. It’s really bold of her to assume you’re only here to bitch and moan about Naruto or something, especially with how often you have to listen to her bitch and moan about Ino lately. So she’s got a secret boyfriend or whatever, get over it.

“Every time you call me out of the blue to hang out or pick me up from my shift, you _always_ wind up bringing up Naruto and complaining about him for half an hour. Just spit it out already so I can enjoy my dinner.”

“Maybe I’m just angry that he dragged me back here to see you clowns for the rest of my life,” you hiss.

“Do you want me to call Hinata? Because if you’re going to be like this I’m sure she’d be willing to have an emergency session with you right now,” she threatens, waving a chopstick menacingly at you from across the table.

You slump over in defeat.

“Ughhhhh, fine, I’m sorry.”

Sakura knows your weakest point: talk therapy. Hinata’s been pioneering a counseling program for “traumatized shinobi” to “express repressed emotion” and “learn to cope with tragedy in less destructive ways” and Kakashi thought you’d be the perfect candidate for it. Bastard just didn’t want to volunteer himself.

Sure, you’ve learned about grief and trauma and whatever else, but at what cost? It’s been a year since you started and she’s still making you do homework every week on processing your emotions. You’re still bitter about the paper on apologies she made you do last summer--8 pages on the history and function of the apology, alongside an example of how to properly execute one drawn from your real life.

The worst part of it is that you have to see her constantly. Every week, you have to endure her mothering aura, blank stare, and soft-voice. At best, she reminds you of Itachi and you spend the entire session missing him; at worse, you think of her all over Naruto and internally writhe in a guilt/jealousy cocktail; and at absolute worst, your mind twists the two feelings together into a horrifying what-if scenario where Itachi is stealing Naruto from you, and you have to push that thought somewhere where it can never be accessed again. And you cannot tell _her_ anything about any of this. Or anyone else. But especially not her.

Sakura calls your attention back to her with an _ahem_. She is still giving you the stink eye.

“I’m really, really sorry,” you relent, “I’d rather talk to my good friend, Sakura, than to a therapist, so I’ll be less of an asshole.”

Satisfied, she leans back in her chair and shakes out her ponytail.

“You have 3 sentences. Choose your words wisely,” she says.

You stare blankly at your cup while you ponder why the hell your conversations always have to revolve around your hopeless crush on Naruto. You’ve never told her (obviously) how you feel about him, but she’s smart enough and close enough to pick it up, and smarter still not to make you admit it before you’re ready (never). She has to enjoy this on some level--does she love seeing you suffer? Does your inner turmoil amuse her? The word “projection” echoes in your ears in Hinata’s voice, so you shake off that thought and jump to the second-most logical conclusion--she loves the drama of it all.

“Same-old, same-old; I hate watching him run in circles with a girl he doesn’t seem to love but I’m stuck saying nothing because I don’t want to cause him pain. I hate rooming with him because he’s a piece of shit idiot who never cleans up after himself and doesn’t understand personal boundaries, so I’m stuck picking up after him and brushing his hands off me. Worst of all, I can’t keep my mind off the situation, and it makes me wish I were back in prison--or better yet, dead--so I don’t have to deal with this bullshit. Now if we can please, please, change the subject…”

Finger pressed to her chin, she says, “I don’t know, Sasuke. Seems to me like this is an upgrade from your usual inner monologue,” she hunches her shoulders, deepens her voice, and growls, “‘Uchiha this, Orochimaru that, Konoha is full of bastards who hate me;’ you know, the usual.”

You are not amused.

“Okay, okay, that was a bit below the belt,” she giggles, “but you see what I mean. It’s nice that you’re happy enough to have a normal, non-catastrophic problem for once.”

“I refuse to feel happy about this. Talk about something else.”

Like a child, she sticks out her tongue at you, so you flick her on the forehead, like an adult. After swatting your hand away, she keeps talking.

“Fine! If you want to be over-dramatic about being _happy_ for once in your life, then I’ll just talk about myself instead!”

“Good. You better.”

She sticks out her tongue again and dodges your attempt to retaliate.

“So how’re things with you and Ino?” you ask. You want her to taste her own nosy medicine.

“She’s… avoiding me.”

She wilts.

“Avoiding you? Still?”

She nods and picks at her food, suddenly very solemn. You wish this weren’t so sad-looking so you could ask her how it tastes being questioned about the rift forming between you and your best friend. Weird enough, she looks up at you expectantly, like she wants you to keep asking.

“Do you know why yet?” you ask, giving in to her request for you to keep prying.

“I’m not sure. We’d been spending so much time together, and I thought things were fine, but then all of a sudden, she starts pulling away when I hug her, making excuses for why she can’t hang out, and any time I ask what’s wrong she insists there’s nothing wrong at all!”

“Maybe she’s got a new boyfriend and doesn’t want to tell you about it,” you suggest, “or something like that.”

She shakes her head.

“I don’t think that’s it. I feel like if it was a boy, she’d want to tell me about it.”

“Not if she was insecure about it. Maybe it’s Akimichi.”

“God--it’s not a new boyfriend, okay?!” she snaps, “I just--I know her better than you; I’d know if it was a boyfriend.”

You nod to show you cede the point. Still think it’s a boyfriend or something, but whatever; it’s not the hill you want Sakura to kill you on.

“Spy on her then. That’ll tell you what’s up.”

“I can’t just spy on my friend, Sasuke!” she scolds, swatting at your shoulder.

“Why not? You’re a ninja, aren’t you?” you ask as you dodge her hand.

“Because that’s insane?”

She lands a smack on the top of your head.

“Then don’t, but you need to find out one way or the other. I’m just as tired of you moping about Ino as you are of me moping about Naruto.”

She rolls her eyes at you.

“So how well has spying worked for you then?”

“Great. It’s how I found out Naruto and Hinata were dating, since he sure wasn’t going to tell me about it. If she’s not talking, take it into your own hands.”

Now she flicks _you_ on the forehead.

“Just fucking talk to him, dummy.”

You two finish your breakfast/dinner in relative peace after that, spending the rest of your time talking about work instead of relationships. You split the bill and you walk her back to her house before getting on with the rest of the day.

You avoid coming home as long as you can, and by the time you slip inside again, it’s past midnight and Naruto is already deep asleep in his room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank for reading! I'll be updating every 2 weeks now until I've completed the fic. Chapter 3 is already finished, and chapter 4 is almost ready.  
> Stay tuned!


	3. That Boy Needs Help

“Welcome, Sasuke!” Hinata says as she ushers you into her newly constructed office. Her smile is soft and sweet. You hate sweet. 

“Please take a seat.”

The chair across from hers is crowded by sunflowers, all turned away from the chair itself to face the morning sun streaming in from the window. It warms the back of your head from the moment you sit down.

Hinata stares as you settle down, so you stare back. Her inner serenity permeates the air. Her hair is tied in a low ponytail slung over her shoulder and her hands are folded over a clipboard in her lap. Patiently she waits for you to say something, and you refuse to oblige. Finally, she gives in to your will and speaks again.

“So why have you decided to sign up for my program?” she asks.

“I didn’t; Kakashi did,” you put it bluntly.

“I’m aware of Lord Hokage’s orders, but you still agreed to come,” she counters, picking up her pen and writing as she speaks, “What do you want to get out of this?”

You cross your arms and lean back in your chair, trying to project as much hostility as you can.

“I have no faith that this will work. I’m here strictly because Kakashi said the village was still uneasy about my presence, and my attendance here was the compromise the people of Konoha agreed to.”

With a chuckle, she counters that too, “You could’ve chosen to leave Konoha again. Why stay if you dislike the conditions so much?”

The sun burns its warmth into your back. You stay silent.

With a lavender-painted finger she clicks her pen again and writes something down.

“We don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to, but I’m afraid there’s little I can do for you if you don’t tell me your feelings.”

“Good. I don’t want a fucking thing from you,” you hiss.

_ His right arm is wrapped around her shoulders as they walk, bathed in yellow light from the streetlamps. She looks up at him, swaddled in his jacket, like he’s saved her. You want to retch. Why didn’t he tell you? Why did he keep this a secret from you? _

But she carries on like you said nothing at all, like you were never meant to say it.

“How about we start with your brother, Itachi.”

“He’s dead. What do you want me to say about him?”

Those blank eyes threaten to bore into you.

“Was he a good brother? Did he protect you? Help you? You know him better than anyone; I want to hear about him from you,” she says.

“Why the fuck should I tell you anything?! You think I owe you my friendship because you’re running around with Naruto?!” you scream, but once again it falls on deaf ears.

Her stare is unrelenting. You break eye-contact, cast your head down, and say what you were supposed to say.

“The best, all I could ever hope to be...” you start, but you falter.

_ I’m not perfect, Sasuke.  _

“No, he  _ did _ his best, but he didn’t always help me,” you continue, “He fucked up. He killed our clan, even if it was on orders from Danzo. But he’s still a good brother.”

Tears stain your palms as you hold your head in your hands. Hinata scribbles on her clipboard.

“And what about you? Are you the sort of man he would be proud of?”

You can’t answer that. You don’t want to answer that.

_ I’ll always love you, Sasuke. _

“Or perhaps, you’re disappointed in the man you are?”

Her sandals clack on the hardwood floor as she walks over to you. You collapse further into yourself as she stands directly in front of you. Her legs block the light coming from behind her, and you feel a chill as you enter the shadows. Wasn’t the sun behind you…?

“It will all come out during the trial, little brother,” Itachi says, “all that poison in your heart lately.”

You jolt back up to see him standing over you. The sunflowers have all turned to face him. 

Behind him sits a table of four people: Kakashi, Sakura, and Hinata, the real one, with her hair let back down.

“Let the hearing of Uchiha Sasuke begin,” Kakashi says with a slam of his gavel. 

“It’s not my time! I already had my hearing!” you scream, “You pardoned me!”

Kakashi sighs like you’ve missed the simplest of points.

“This is for your behavior since then, Sasuke. You didn’t expect to just get away with it, did you?”

You try to talk back but Itachi places his hand on your shoulder and you fall quiet as he speaks for you.

“And what are the charges against my brother, Lord Hokage?”

The sunflowers watch you like a jury.

“Uchiha Sasuke is charged with attempting to destroy Uzumaki Naruto’s happiness for selfish desires.”

_ Her letter to him. She asked you to pass it on for her since you live with him. You burned it. He asked if she ever wants you to talk about him in your sessions. You said no, never. He didn’t tell you. His arm was around her, his jacket was around her.  _ I just wanted to be around you, _ he told you then. Did it mean anything to him? _

_ Of course it didn’t. Not like it meant to you. Because Naruto has something you never will, and for a million reasons you will never belong in this village. He will be happy with a wife one day, and you will drown, suffocated in the people you can never be. _

“I call Haruno Sakura to present her statement,” Kakashi says.

Sakura rises, and refuses to look you in the eye.

“I am a beautiful and powerful kunoichi, and more importantly, I am Sasuke’s closest female friend. Over and over, I have given him the option to date me, to find happiness with me, and he turns me down, over and over. Kakashi-sensei, I’m not sure Sasuke wants to find happiness of his own. Every time he talks to me, it always goes back to how miserable Naruto’s happiness makes him. He’s even confessed to me how he spied on Naruto’s dates with Hinata”

Your heart pounds in your ears. Itachi’s hand grips your shoulder tight.

Itachi says, “My brother does seek happiness for himself, in his own way. Would he sit here in Konoha if he did not value Naruto’s happiness even above his own?”

“That statement is a lie, Lord Hokage,” Hinata shouts.

She stands and gives you a small smile. Your throat tightens.

“Uchiha Sasuke has made great progress in the year I’ve worked with him. He has completed every assignment I’ve given him, and his friends, including Sakura, have noted his increased ability to apologize and calm himself in times of emotional turmoil--that much is true of his character. But…” she begins to trail off. Her voice cracks with tears as she continues.

“But… What have I ever done to you to make you hate me? All I’ve ever done is make Naruto happy like you never could! And all I get in return is that cold stare. You think I can’t tell how you want to steal him away from me, make him like  _ you? _ It’s pathetic how you cling to him and then hate me because he doesn’t want you.”

Itachi cannot hold you back now. With a clatter, your chair slams to the ground as you jump to your feet, boiling with rage.

“You don’t make him happy! A fucking year you’ve been together and he looks for any opportunity to get out of your dates. You call, and I see guilt flash in his eyes as he lets it ring. You interrupt our nights in by surprise, and I see the exhaustion in him. He’ll never love me, but he doesn’t love you either, and I will revel in that until they bury me.” 

_ Bang! Bang! Bang! _ the gavel cracks down on the table, splitting the wood panel down to the floor.

“You will not speak out of turn in this courtroom, Sasuke,” Kakashi demands, voice low and threatening like thunder rolling, “I think it’s time I decided your sentence.”

The sunflowers close in, enveloping you, blocking everyone from view but the one man holding your fate in his hand again.

“Do you know you only see what you want to?” he asks.

You can’t answer.

The gavel slams down to declare your fate, splitting the floor all the way to your feet.

“Uchiha Sasuke,” the sunflowers say, “the jury finds you guilty of all charges.”

The fissure beneath you opens up and you fall. You can only watch as the yellow petals turn to golden hair, and you fall forever away from the love of your life, and he watches back, motionless. You try to turn your head away, but you can’t move.

He’s smiling.

You wake up alone, burning with shame.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to update you guys, I'm a little burnt out on writing this thing! I'll edit chapter 4, see if I can't finish chapter 5 as well, then I'll likely put this fic on hiatus for a while. I'll be writing other, smaller, more intimate, more fun fics while I get back in the groove of dealing with this behemoth. You'll see chapter 4 in two weeks, and we'll go from there! Thanks everyone who's enjoyed so far!


	4. "Training" "Exercise"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nearly forgot to upload today! Enjoy!

At the crack of dawn, Naruto dragged you out of bed, threw you a change of clothes, and told you to pack for an overnight hike— _ Right now! Hurry, we gotta go right now or we’ll be late! _ You tried in vain to get an answer out of him—where you were going, why you had to leave now, if you even had permission to leave the village—but Naruto was in too much of a rush to tell you anything until you were at the gates meeting up with a bunch of your former male classmates plus Lee, Sai, and some weird guy in sunglasses, most of whom were far too chipper for 6:30 AM.

“Are you all ready for our training excursion by the lake?!” Lee shouts to the high heaven, cracking your eardrums in half. He’s bouncing up and down, jogging in place, his shiny black hair swaying with his motion, and you have never felt so much disgust towards another human being.

“Geez, Sasuke, what crawled up your ass and died?” Naruto asks you as he ‘playfully’ elbows you in the ribs (as if he does not know  _ exactly _ what crawled up your ass and died), “You’d think you’d be happy to go train with just us guys again!”

You yank his ear and pull him close to hiss, “I see enough of you assholes at the bathhouse,” over his string of  _ ow-ow-ow _ ’s. Of all the things you miss about being benched until Hinata clears you for team missions, you miss seeing ‘us guys’ the least.

He retaliates by trying to put you into a headlock with your arm still in the way, so you pull harder, and he squeezes harder, and you cycle like that until Shikamaru tells you that you look like babies trying to kill each other and the shame forces you apart.

You spend most of the 4-hour downhill hike wondering how the hell they got Kakashi to agree to letting you all have a camping trip and occasionally watching the stupid boredom-killing antics of your party. Lee walks on his hands and Naruto tries to balance things on his feet without him noticing. Shikamaru points out cloud formations to Akimichi, and Inuzuka shouts that one of them looks like balls, and they all stop to determine if it does or doesn’t look like balls before reaching a unanimous decision that the cloud indeed looks kinda like a ballsack. They ask you to agree that the cloud looks scrotal, and you tell them you went blind again. You try to remember Inuzuka’s and Akimichi’s first names, and draw a complete blank. It might be Tsume and Choumaru, but you can’t say you care.

The banal conversation is only interrupted by the river’s vain attempts to drown it out, until the lake finally comes into view. It stretches before you, an expanse of green bubbling with life just under the surface, guarded by trees on the side opposite you and hills behind you. The canopy of the forest is aflutter with birds darting to and from their nests, caring for their broods. You feel almost peaceful watching it come closer as you come down the hill—until Tsume shatters the idyllic scenery by barking directions.

Why is everyone so fucking shouty?

“As soon as we set all our shit down, we’ll split off into groups. Me, Akamaru, and Shino know this area best, so we’ll put up the barriers while we forage. Shikamaru and Chouji”—oh, that’s his name then—"you guys are the best fishers, so I want you to take Naruto and Sai and show them the ropes. I’d give you Sasuke instead, but you only brought poles with reels and he’s only got one arm”—absolute fucker, you could just spear-fish in the river—“plus I don’t trust Naruto not to find the one poisonous shrub in the area and try to burn it. So that leaves Sasuke and Lee to find kindling and start the cooking fire. Any questions?”

“Yeah, I got one!” Naruto says, giving you have the funniest feeling he’s going to say some stupid shit and start a lengthy pissing contest, “Who died and put you in charge? I’m the one who planned the trip!”

“Because I know more about camping than any of you, that’s why” he answers smugly.

“This is for fun! It’s not fun if you tell everyone what—”

Slapping your hand over his mouth, you interject, “Just do what Tsume says; he practically lives out here.”

Naruto’s eyes widen in confusion, but you realize your mistake too late and not-Tsume is already yelling.

“FIVE YEARS! WE SHARED A CLASS FOR FIVE YEARS! I KNOW YOU KNOW MY NAME!”

Nothing you can do but roll with it.

“I just said it’s Tsume.”

“That’s my  _ mom’s _ name! I know you’re just trying to piss me off,” he growls while the guy in sunglasses holds him by the shoulder and mutters something about being forgotten. Naruto is on the verge of tears from choking back his laughter.

“Sorry, you just never made much of an impression on me,” you say. Your therapist voice tells you that’s too blunt, but you haven’t unlocked the part of your brain that comes up with better solutions on the fly yet. You think that’s like an S-rank therapy skill.

“It’s Kiba! Ki-ba!” he keeps shouting as his friend and dog push him towards the campsite, but you can barely hear him over Naruto howling in your ear next to you. Even as you close the last few meters and start dropping your things, he’s still just barely suppressing his snickers.

As he passes you on the way to the docks, he claps you on the back and says, “You’re funny as shit sometimes, you know?”

“I’m not, but thanks,” you answer, shrugging his hand off.

He flashes you a smile and a wink before turning his back on you and throwing an arm around Sai, who looks at him like he’s been waiting his whole life for Naruto to pull him that close. You wonder if Sai feels the same way you do--the pining and longing. He better fucking not. The last thing you need in your life is some bastard you hate competing with you over who gets to be more heartbroken by the fact that Naruto will never love you.

You two might not be so at odds if you hadn’t made such a show of trying to kill him the first time you met, but you don’t really have any intent of apologizing. Not after he made it clear he had no intent of forgiving you.

_ He cornered you a few days after your return in an alley. Instinctively, your hand hovered close to the hilt of your sword, but Sai made no motions to attack. Instead, he spoke to you. _

_ “You don’t deserve how much he’s given up for you,” he told you, his malice palpable, “His own blood that he’s spilled to protect you… You’d better find a way to pay that back in kind.” _

_ “I know what he’s sacrificed,” you answered. _

_ “I doubt that.” _

_ He disappeared as quickly as he had come, but you still felt uneasy. A hand waves rapidly in front of your eyes. _

Wait, that’s Lee.

“Sasuke, are you alright?”

He’d said your name a couple of times by now, you start to realize.

“Hm. Yea,” is all the response you can come up with. He still looks concerned.

“What you need”—he locks your arm with his—"is a rousing jog through the forest!”

He pulls you along at a brisk pace towards the thicket, still talking as you go.

“Neji too would get lost inside his own thoughts, and jogs and conversation helped keep him grounded. Perhaps Hinata did not tell you that, as it was something we did together as Team Guy.”

You shake your head and break loose of his grip so you can jog properly.

“I don’t need therapy for spacing out.”

He smiles up at you. You hadn’t noticed you’d gotten taller than him until now.

“Staying grounded is important—it helps you live the present fully rather than dwelling on the past or feeling paralyzed by the future,” he says, “If you’d like, I can guide you the way Neji and I used to. It’s like meditating while moving.”

He seems eager for you to say yes, and you can tell already that once again you are the screen on which someone else is projecting a dead friend. Why’s it always you?

“Just don’t forget we’re supposed to be collecting firewood,” you answer.

“We can gather on the way! First, I want you to take note of the rhythm of your body the sensation of it as you move. Your breath, your feet hitting the ground, the beating of your heart…”

Your breathing is even and deep, like you learned when you were young and practicing the fireball; your feet  _ thud-thud-thud _ in time with Lee’s; but your heart feels faster than it should. Your stomach feels twisted.

“What does your rhythm tell you?”

“I still feel uneasy.”

“From when you were lost in thought?”

“No, I felt like this when I started packing this morning too.”

“Do you know why you began feeling that way?”

_ A full day with people you don’t like and barely know who don’t like you either and definitely don’t know you. _

“No.”

“Then you will have to figure that out another time. For now, focus outside yourself. Take note of sounds, smells, sights. If you have strong feelings about them, notice that too, but do not pay them more mind than the many other things around you.”

The sunlight speckles on your skin, blocked by the leaves above but not entirely, creating little spots of warmth in the cool shade of the forest. You can smell some fragrant flower in bloom, but you don’t know its name. The cicada haven’t begun to sing yet, but there are dozens of bugs flying around in the humid late spring air. A bee hangs around you and Lee, buzzing back and forth before losing interest and returning to gathering nectar. The heaviness of the air feels like it’s just about to coalesce into summer rains.

“Tell me what the world is like, Sasuke.”

“It’s like everything is on the verge of passing into the next season.”

“Yes, change!” he exclaims as he hops upward, pumping his fist, “As much as I enjoy the spring, when the trees regain their leaves and the world is in bloom again, I cannot wait for the heat of summer! It’s an invigorating time of year!”

“I guess the heat is nice,” you say.

He inhales deeply (and loudly).

“I should expect this to be a good season for the both of us! Tell me how you’re feeling right now, Sasuke!”

You really wish he would stop staring at you so intensely. His eyes are wide open and his brow furrowed.

“Okay, I guess,” you say with a shrug, “Can we just get the firewood now?”

Despite Lee’s insistence on trying to turn your chore into a contest against himself by trying to stack as much kindling on himself as possible and keep it balanced while he walks on his hands back to the campsite, you return long before anyone else. Even digging the pit and getting everything ready for the cookfire only takes you a short while to finish, and soon you have nothing left to distract you from looking out at the docks.

His orange jacket is tossed behind him, exposing his strong shoulders as they shake with laughter. You’ve never felt more grateful nor more bitter towards the standard-issue mesh armor and its tight fit. The way the whisker-like markings on his face pull back as he smiles is perfectly visible with his face in profile, lit by the midday sun—they caress his round cheeks and emphasize the strength of his jaw. What would it be like to trace those lines with your fingers while you sit next to him, feet dipped in the cool water, his hand on your waist…

“Sasuke, you are spacing out again.”

Lee interrupts your train of thought with a gently placed hand on your shoulder.

“I’m fine,” you snap. You feel like your thoughts can be read on your face and it makes you want to tear it off. Just like you feared, Lee’s mouth opens in dawning realization and your stomach drops.

“Ooooh, I understand!” he says as grabs your other shoulder and turns you to face him, “You feel as strongly about Naruto as a rival as I felt about Neji!”

_ Oh thank god, he’s so fucking stupid. _ You nod along heterosexually. Tears well in his eyes and he hugs you suddenly.

“You and Naruto remind me so much of Neji and I! I’m so glad you came on this trip so I may remember my cherished times with him!” he sobs into your shoulder. You hope no one is seeing this.

Unsure how to respond, you pat him on the back. Your shirt is all wet and gross now. Just as suddenly as he dove for you, he pulls away to wipe his tears.

“I think I will go for a run by myself,” he says as he rises from the ground around the unlit cookfire you’d been sitting around. Before you can say anything back to him, he’s already sped off into the thicket.

Your stomach rumbles. With the morning rush, you didn’t have much time to do anything but scarf down some cold rice in the rice cooker from last night—of course, if you’re hungry, Naruto’s probably starving. He’s always been a wimp about skipping meals. If he’d just let you know last night that you’d be going out today, you could’ve packed lunch for both of you. Instead all you could manage was to cram a bunch of protein bars into your bag, and you bet if you looked in Naruto’s bag you’d find cup ramen, no chopsticks, and nothing to boil water in.

You rifle through your bag and pull out the bars and chopsticks you packed for him and slip them into his bag. You glance back over at the docks, taking note of their empty fishing basket. Guess you’ll have to prove to Tsume (Wait, it was or it wasn’t Tsume? Tsume seems like the correct name) that he should’ve put you on the fishing team afterall.

With a spare fishing basket and a snack for yourself in tow, you head towards a stream that branches into the woods off the lake. You glance once more at the docks where Naruto sits, and like he senses you, he turns and waves, beckoning you. You shake your head and lift your basket then point to the stream. Confused, he points at his rod, so you turn to gesture to your sword. You see him open his mouth in a loud ‘Oooooh!’ before giving you a thumbs-up and then waving goodbye so wildly he nearly knocks Shikamaru into the water. You continue on to make sure you both get dinner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you enjoy? I hope so, because we are officially on hiatus while I resupply my chapter buffer. You can expect to finally (finally!) see Naruto and Sasuke hangin' out in chapter 5. Whenever I decide you get to.  
> Ciao!


	5. The Stars Above

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, for being patient while I sort out this whole story. I can't promise consistent updates yet, but I'm getting there.

The long day was finally winding down--the sun was settling among the hills as you all finished dinner. Between the 8 of you, you managed to pull together enough resources for a good meal. Naruto (of course) forgot his outdoor rice cooker, but the guy in the coat brought an extra just in case, and you’d made sure to grab miso when you were packing. Choumaru roasted the fish you’d caught perfectly, and it paired well with the foraged vegetables.

But not everyone was happy with the way the meal turned out.

“Next time we’re only taking three anglers,” Shikamaru says to Tsume while pointing at Naruto with his chopsticks.

“What?! I caught the biggest fish! You should be glad I was there,” Naruto says. It was a tasty bass too.

“You got lucky with the _only_ fish you caught today. Chouji and Sai each caught two.”

“You’re just mad that you didn’t catch any!” Naruto snickers.

“I would’ve caught plenty if you didn’t keep bumping into me or tangling our lines.”

Shikamaru’s scowl is deep and it only gets deeper as Choumaru places a gentle hand on his back and says, “You can’t say you would’ve caught the fish if you didn’t catch the fish.”

You decide to throw your towel in the ring.

“None of you caught as many angling as I did spear-fishing. Two, two, one and zero to my four.”

You glare at Tsume. He better remember the one arm comment. Whether or not he does, you’ve clearly made him nervous, and he starts cutting into the conversation.

“Who cares about the fish! You should all be grateful for me, Akamaru, and Shino for getting everything else to eat with it!”

“I think you’ve forgotten something else we’ve brought for this meal, Kiba,” the weird guy interjects, almost giving you a fucking heart attack in the process. He’s truly the stealthiest of you here. Is he Anbu or something? Did Naruto make friends in Anbu? 

~~Tsume~~ Kiba grins and shouts, “Fuck, dude, I did forget,” then they both grab something from their bags and bring it to the campfire.

“It’s beer!”

“What a coincidence,” Shikamaru says as he and Choumaru rifle through their own belongings, “We brought some too.”

Lee, visibly distressed, speaks up, “But half of you are still underage and we are on a training excursion!”

Wagging his finger condescendingly, Naruto corrects him, “This is a team building exercise first and foremost! And we’ll all be 20 in a couple of months, so bending the rules for the sake of building better friendship is definitely okay!”

Something horrible happens to Lee’s face. It’s like he’s sprung a leak; he could drown like that.

“YOU’RE RIGHT, NARUTO! BUILDING TEAMWORK IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING!” he shouts with fervor, the idea of male-bonding and trust between friends overwhelming him visibly. He carries on like that for a minute before settling down again, “But I will still have to refrain. I am a very disorderly drunk and very sensitive to alcohol.”

“That’s good,” Shikamaru says, “We’ll divvy up your share, and you can stay alert just in case.”

“You can take my share, too,” Sai says, pulling out a flask of god-knows-what, “I brought something for myself.”

Before anyone had downed their first beer, you thought they were all idiotic and boisterous--the impression is much worse now. They’re singing and dancing and telling jokes around the fire you built while you gently nurse your first beer. They’re Naruto’s friends, and you know you’re only here because Naruto willed it so.

_You don’t deserve how much he’s given up for you_

Pulling your cape a little tighter, you walk out to the dock. As you finish your drink, you kick your feet in the water and stare up at the stars.

Itachi tried to teach you constellations many times when you were young, but no matter how much you tried, you could never connect the patterns in the sky with all the stories of gods and heroes. Even now their grandeur is beyond you, but there is one that’s always stuck with you: a tengu teaching an Uchiha the Susanoo. There was some story your father told you about it that you don’t remember at all, some trick pulled, deals cut; what stuck was that there was an Uchiha up there learning secret techniques. It was so cool to you that you even called Itachi stupid when he tried to tell you it was a tengu and a Buddhist monk.

_“Dad already said it’s an Uchiha learning some cool jutsu!”_

_Itachi sighed at you. He points back up at the sky, but you shake your head and cross your arms and refuse to look again._

_“Don’t you see his shaved head? He could be a monk, too,” he tries to explain._

_“I like dad’s story better. Yours is stupid.”_

_“It’s not my story, Sasuke, that’s what most of Konoha sees.”_

_You blew a raspberry at him._

_“Then you guys are all dumb! It’s an Uchiha learning a super cool jutsu!”_

“Why ya sittin’ out here all by yourself?”

Naruto. It’s always Naruto. He plops down beside you--your fantasy from earlier flashes through your mind (your fingers tracing the whisker-like markings on his cheek as he pulls you by the waist, closer and closer until your lips meet and my god here you go again with this shit). You duck into your collar and inch away from him, heat rising up the back of your neck.

“I prefer to drink by myself.”

Naruto nudges you gently and hands you a full can of beer to replace the empty one sitting beside you.

“Then we’ll be alone together.”

You take it gladly. The two of you drink in silence for a precious few moments before Naruto opens his mouth again.

“So what’s eatin’ you?”

“I’m fine,” you assure him.

“That’s bullshit, y’know,” he says, scooting closer to you so that your thighs touch, “Tell me what’s going on in that dumb brain of yours or I’ll knock it out of you.”

Dumbass always fronts like this, like he’s done more than give you a noogie since you started therapy last year.

“Fine,” you groan, “Earlier… I was thinking about how I don’t really get along with anyone in Konoha--”

“It’s your personality.”

“Shut the fuck up. I’m absolute shit at being a Konoha shinobi, so what am I? An Uchiha? I’m shit at that too. When I was young, my mom and my dad, my brother, my cousins, my grandparents, aunts and uncles… They all told me so many, many things I never understood or I can’t remember because I was so young, nevermind everything they never bothered to tell me. It’s centuries of history and I only had seven fucking years to absorb it and I just _didn’t_ , I took it all for granted, I didn’t know how important any of it was! I can’t--I can’t be the perfect Uchiha, I can’t do it! How the hell am I supposed to carry on my whole clan when I can’t even--”

“Woah, woah! It’s okay, Sasuke,” he says. His arms wrap around you and he presses your face into his shoulder. Wet and hot. You didn’t realize you’d started to cry. How fucking humiliating.

Softly he speaks again, “You don’t have to be perfect.”

“I do,” you mumble into his jacket. You sound so pathetic. You feel pathetic, but you don’t know how to stop right now. He combs your hair with his fingers until you can finally pull yourself away from him.

Your hand finally free, you point up at the tengu among the stars.

“Do you see the tengu? Is he with an Uchiha shinobi or a Buddhist monk?”

He squints, searching the sky.

“It’s just a bunch of fuckin’ stars to me, dude.”

You trace out the shape of the tengu’s nose, his geta, his arm outstretched, then the shape of the high collar of an Uchiha, the ribs of the Susanoo, the fan on his back.

Naruto shakes his head.

“Still just seeing stars,” he says.

“God, fine, that’s not the point anyway. The point is there’s a whole story about how this guy learned Susanoo from a tengu, and I don’t know it. My dad told me when I was five and I can’t tell you anything about it except that he tricks the tengu somehow to get it.”

“I mean, if you’re telling the story now, isn’t it up to you?”

“This is more than a story, dumbass, it’s history! Legend!”

“I don’t know, if it really happened, then it probably happened a really long time ago, and it probably didn’t happen the way your dad told you anyway. I can’t even tell a story that happened to me the same way twice. You’re the only Uchiha, that means you decide how to tell the stories.”

“You’re too stupid for this,” you whine, leaning against him again, “What would my parents think of me now…”

Naruto caresses your cheek with the back of his hand--oh god is he going to kiss you?! He can’t--he won’t--he doesn't. He sweeps your hair out of your face and smiles while shame boils in your stomach.

What would they think of you?

“They’d know how hard this is for you. You can’t be the whole Uchiha clan,” he whispers, soft and sweet, his fingers still slipping your hair behind your ear, “so it’s best if you just try to be Sasuke, y’know.”

When did he ever get so understanding? You let him play with your hair, close your eyes and just breathe deeply while he combs it and twists it. When you open your eyes again, you see the mistiness clouding his.

“Are you crying?” you ask.

“No, no way dude!” he lies as a tear spills from the corner of his eye before he can hide it by wiping at his eyes, “It’s just from the pollen or something, I’m fine.”

He sees you’re unconvinced and keeps trying to avoid fessing up, “Seriously, Sasuke, you’re the one who’s upset right now. Don’t worry--”

You snatch his hand away from his face.

“I did not make a fool of myself crying in front of you for you to try to swallow your own tears. Tell me. Now.”

Guilt paints over his handsome features and you do not relent. You stare him down as sternly as you can while puffy-eyed and buzzed until he finally caves.

“You kinda reminded me about all the junk with my own clan. Like, I don’t know how to be an Uzumaki either. Sure there’s some of us left, but I only know Karin, and I’ve tried talking to her about it but she doesn’t know a whole lot more than I do. My mom told me about how the Uzumaki village got wiped out—before, I didn’t really get how much that hurts ‘cause it was like this whole tragedy that happened way before I was born.”

The frustration in him rises and rises as he continues. You can only listen, your hand still in his.

“But like you said, there’s all this stuff and all these people I didn’t ever get to know because of that! Like maybe I would’ve had cousins or grandparents or somebody who would’ve took me in, or maybe me and my mom wouldn’t have had to be a jinchuuriki!”

So lonely. You were both so painfully lonely, with no one left to care for you. His hurt was always so visible to you--why did no one ever bother to look after him? Why did no one take him in and give him a home, a family?

He tried so hard to make those connections with everyone, but especially you. And you… you tried over and over to sever what you had. He had so little, you knew he had so little and you still tried to rip his heart out. Literally. You were his friend, someone he loved and trusted, and suddenly you turned on him, pretending that you never cared.

Just like Itachi did to you.

“I shouldn’t have left you like that,” you say, “way back at the Valley of the End. It was messed up for me to try to kill you like that.”

“No way, dude!” he exclaims as he rubs his nasty wet face all over your your hand, “It was messed up for me to try to drag you back! I said I was gonna break all your bones!” He grabs your wrist with both hands and waves your own arm in front of your face. “Your boooooones, Sasuke!”

“This is a no-goofing conversation, usuratonkachi,” you say, stifling your laugh and snatching your hand back, “If you’re going to be stupid, go talk to everyone else.”

“Okay, okay, I’ll be sad forever just like you want.”

“Good.”

He throws himself back on the dock, so you join him, looking back up at the stars together. There must be a Susanoo somewhere in the sky, somewhere after the shinobi learned it. You trace over the stars and hope there’s books still hidden in the shrines.

“D’you think there’s special Uzumaki constellations?” Naruto pipes up beside you.

“You guys had a whole village to yourselves, so yeah, I think there are.”

“What do you think they are?”

“Maybe the tengu is teaching your ancestor how to seal.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

His loneliness aches in your bones and your only relief is to lace your fingers with his. You have never been happier for your distance from the others or for how easily touching comes to Naruto.

“I don’t understand why you aren’t angry,” you say.

“I dunno. I had to kill my anger or something way back when Kurama and I weren’t friends yet and he was still just pissed off all the time.”

He shifts, settling his free hand over his stomach.

“It’s not wrong to be angry.”

He hums his disagreement, “Hmmm... but don’t you get tired of being angry?”

“I have limitless stamina for anger,” you tell him, “Besides, someone has to be angry for everything this village--and everything anyone else--has put you through.”

He squeezes your hand.

“I want you to be happy too, y’know.”

You squeeze back.

“I’m never happy.”

He draws circles with his thumb, soft and slow on the back of your hand.

“You seem pretty happy with Sakura…”

“Where are you going with this?” you ask.

“Nowhere!” he squeaks (like you’ve caught him), “It’s just… you don’t spend a whole lot of time with me now. It’s like you’re always out meeting Sakura for breakfast or something all day and that’s cool! Totally, totally cool! But…”

“But?”

“But I wanna hang out too, dude!”

You were going to tell him you hang out all the time, that you’re hanging out right now, but the words get lost in your throat as Naruto caresses your cheek again, pushing you to meet his gaze. That lonesome gaze draws you in and you are hypnotized by him--the stars sparkle in his eyes, creating constellations that tell only the story of a fool who chose to be kind and made the world fall in love with him. You could see yourself in those stars, bargaining and begging to change yourself into someone worthy of him.

He speaks and you answer the only way you can: “Sure, usuratonkachi, if it gets you off my back.”

“Great! I’ll talk to Hinata; she can get us into some place fancy. This is gonna be so sick,” he replies.

But something still feels… off. Like he’s hiding something.

“Are you…” you start, but think better of it, “Nevermind.”

He frowns at you and whines, “Sasuke, we cannot keep doing this.”

“Fine, fine. Are you still in love with her? Sakura, I mean.”

His eyes go wide, he scoffs, he shakes his head.

“No way, dude! I’m with Hinata, and I would never, never try to get between you two. Never!”

He’s left you utterly unconvinced.

“…Between us?”

“I know you’re still mad that I didn’t tell you that I was seeing Hinata, but it’s been months! You don’t have to do the same thing to me,” he says.

“This is different—I’m not hiding anything.”

“I’m not stupid,” he grumbles, clearly hurt, “You’re keeping something from me, and if it’s not Sakura, then what is it?”

Well that’s a loaded question. That’s a really loaded question and you are going to choke to death.

“We aren’t dating. That’s all I can say.”

His eyes sparkle with understanding, and you know he’s just drawn the wrong conclusion.

He smiles sweetly, and says, “I’ll help you out, okay, Sasuke? I just want you to be happy.”

You don’t know how to tell him the truth without telling him the whole truth, and you can’t risk that right now. Those star-sparkled blue eyes hide sadness, and you cannot hurt him more by confusing his feelings further.

But he is smiling. Whatever you do, you have to keep him smiling. Maybe there’s still a way to make him happy. Maybe Sakura has started to like him back. Maybe you’ll “move on” from her, and he’ll realize he doesn’t have feelings for Hinata. Maybe in the midst of all this mess, he’ll be happy—you can be satisfied with that.

Hair brushes against your cheek as he nestles in the crook of your shoulder, still drawing circles on your hand. The sky is clear and the fire is dying down behind you. The tengu gives an Uchiha the key to his loved one’s happiness, the secret to protecting his heart, and the man cherishes it in the great expanse of space, warm in the presence of so many little suns.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time on LJBK: Kakashi Comes Forward!!   
> Get ready for some student+teacher bonding.


End file.
